Page 11 of Taming Waves

“You want me to go in with you?” I asked when I pulled into her driveway.

“No. Dad is still at work. We’ll tell them tomorrow. I just want to go to bed,” she said.

I took her hand in mine and brought it to my lips, gently brushing them over the pulse point on the inside of her wrist. She took a calming breath.

“Okay. I’ll call you later to say good night,” I promised, leaning over to kiss her forehead. She then opened the door and walked into her house.

“Damn,” Sebastian murmurs, and it pulls me back from the memory. “Thatwasheavy.”

I nod.

“That’s not even the worst part. I dropped her off, and I went to your graduation party that night and drank myself stupid. Then, the next day, I hopped in the car and went off with youand Anson to work on the yacht for the summer and never looked back. I didn’t call her or speak to her again—not until we returned home and walked into Whiskey Joe’s.”

“Fuck.”

Sebastian and Anson had graduated. I hadn’t, and while we were working and playing in Hawaii, I decided that I wasn’t going back. I finished senior year online, and we spent the next few years living the dream.

And Audrey was home, living a nightmare.

“Well, it makes a lot more sense now,” he says.

“What?”

“Her reaction to you.”

“Ah, you mean her barely contained rage?”

“Yeah, that,” he agrees.

“I deserve it—I know I do—but I’m not the same kid who left Sandcastle Cove, and I’m going to do everything I can to show her that.”

He shakes his head as he stands and takes hold of the wheel again. “Good luck.”

“Thanks.”

It’s going to take more than luck. I’m going to need a fucking miracle.

Audrey

Iraise my arms over my head and bend at the waist, stretching my lower back. Heather, a member of my waitstaff and one of my best friends, is bouncing on her toes.

“God, I’m so stiff,” she whines.

“Me too,” I agree.

We run together anytime our schedules allow, which hasn’t been often lately.

“We need to join a gym or something,” she suggests.

I chuckle. “Okay.”

We tried that once. We convinced ourselves that we would go every day before work. I think we made it three, maybe four times before we realized that arriving home at three in the morning and then trying to get motivated before noon just wasn’t possible.

“You should talk Brew into converting the storage closet off the break room into a gym. We could pump iron on our lunch hour or get some reps before heading home at night. If it’s right there, we’d definitely use it,” she suggests.

“The gym is literally two blocks from the bar. I don’t think location is the issue,” I tell her.

I turn and start to jog down the sidewalk at a slow, warm-up pace, and she falls in step beside me. We follow our usual route—from my apartment building to down by the pier and then westbound—increasing our speed at regular intervals.

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